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Mom Fights for Her Boy With Down Syndrome After School Stays Silent About His 'Fall' on the Bus

NewsPublished Jun 17, 2019
By Genny Glassman
Michael PerrinFacebook/Angel Rivera

The family of an East Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania, 7-year-old boy with Down syndrome is demanding answers after the child mysteriously got off the bus in the morning bloody and with scratches across his face. Devastated, the family of Michael Perrin asked his school what happened and were shocked when school administrators allegedly refused to give them answers, specifically access to footage of the bus ride that would tell them the full story.

Perrin's mother said she was called to come pick up her son only 45 minutes after she put him on the bus in the morning.

The 52-year-old mom, Elizabeth Aguero, explained that her son had been riding the bus to Resica Elementary School on June 5 when she got a strange phone call only 45 minutes after he was picked up, People reported.

"They told me there was an incident and that my son was bleeding,” she said. “I needed to get there immediately and [they asked], ‘Should [we] call an ambulance?’ It’s hard to describe. It was horrible. It was hard to see my baby covered in blood.”

When the mom arrived at school, her son was in tears and no one was able to give her any clear indication of what happened. Two nurses at the school allegedly told the mom that they didn't know what happened, only that Perrin “fell off the bus when he was going to school in the morning.”

Perrin is nonverbal, which meant he had no way of speaking up for himself and explaining his story.

The boy was badly bruised and he had a black eye on his left side. He also had several scratches running along his face.

Aguero rushed her son to St. Luke’s Hospital’s Monroe Campus, which is where he was diagnosed with "two fractures in his face his eye is swollen shut with leakage and we still don’t know the severity of his eye injuries," his brother Angel Rivera wrote on Facebook.

The situation only got worse when the family asked for more information about the incident and were denied access to the full story. Aguero told Yahoo! Lifestyle that the elementary school refused to give them the footage of what happened to Perrin without a subpoena.

“Nobody wants to see their child hurt. There was no reason for my son to fall on his head,” the mom added to People. “It’s hard. They said they don’t know exactly what happened. The school wouldn’t allow me to see the [surveillance video].”

The mom then took her case to the Pennsylvania State Police and filed a report on June 6.

With the help of police, Aguero was finally able to obtain the footage of her son's incident, but the video was even more infuriating.

Police showed the mom the video that they had gotten from Perrin's school, and although it was clear that her son did fall off his school bus, the mom said that school staff on the bus at the time were clearly "negligent."

“He fell off the bus needlessly. No one should have immunity against child negligence,” the mom said in a video she posted to YouTube. “May Michael have justice for the negligence and failure to protect this little angel. Because of you, your mommy will fight so this will never happen to another child again.”

The mom is speaking out about her son's incident so no other child with special needs will have to suffer. “I don’t want this to happen to another kid. Another kid may not survive this,” she explained. “I want better training. Michael is not the first, but I want him to be the last."

She continued that staff should have been paying better attention to her son and argued that they need better training when dealing with kids with special needs.

The mom has even taken her story to the internet, where it has garnered a lot of attention. Rapper Cardi B even lent her support for the family. On her Instagram stories she posted about Perrin's incident and captioned her posts with ""#justiceformichael,” “We still speak for you Papi, you will be heard” she said in her post. “Absolutely not today Satan.”

Aguero said she will continue to pursue action against the school. “Life was normal, everything is good. Now this,” she explained. “We’re just trying to make [Perrin] as comfortable and happy as possible.”

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